How can I make my own vinegar?
How can I turn excess wine into delicious wine vinegar at home? For those who have done it, are there any useful tips to get the best results?
I do not have access to any "mother of vinegar" starter culture, and am not likely to spend money on it; however, I DO have a well-stocked home kitchen and a lot of patience.
Edit: To be more specific about my questions
- How long should it take to ferment, and when do I give up if it's not vinegary?
- Do I need to add sugar/water for low-sweetness or high-alcohol wines?
- How do I collect Mother of Vinegar for use in fresh batches?
Best Answer
Although you can hope that the right bacteria will get from the air into a bottle of wine you left open, you will get quicker and more reliable results using unpasteurized cider vinegar. Unpasteurized means there should still be plenty of the needed acetobacter.
Pour your vinegar half and half with red wine in a container that you leave open (but with cheesecloth to prevent bugs and all to get inside) and let it sit in a dark spot 2-4 weeks.
Different sources recommend using solution with a 5-7% alcohol content, so any wine (typically ?15%) diluted by half with vinegar should be fine.
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Quick Answer about "How can I make my own vinegar?"
To make your own vinegar, start by pouring equal parts wine and water into a sterilized jar. Alternatively, you can use hard cider or beer instead of wine. Next, add vinegar starter to the jar, and seal the jar with a cheesecloth or paper towel and a rubber band.How can I make vinegar at home?
How to Make Vinegar at Home \u2013 Step-by-StepCan vinegar be made naturally?
Raw Materials. Vinegar is made from a variety of diluted alcohol products, the most common being wine, beer, and rice. Balsamic vinegar is made from the Trebbiano and Lambrusco grapes of Italy's Emilia-Romagna region. Some distilled vinegars are made from wood products such as beech.Can you make vinegar from anything?
Often when we make vinegar, we start with wine or beer or that has already been fermented, as this simply speeds up the process. It is also quite possible to make vinegar from fruit scraps of every kind. The ferment passes through an alcoholic stage, and then the alcohol is metabolized into acetic acid, aka vinegar.Can you make your own white vinegar?
You can make vinegar out of anything that has alcohol in it\u2014wine, hard apple cider, and even beer\u2014and white vinegar is made from a vodka-esque spirit distilled from grain. Microorganisms get drunk, and we get vinegar. Cool.Why I started making my own vinegars from scratch...
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Answer 2
My accidental vinegar just happened, and I have been able to propagate it by pouring the last few teaspoons from one bottle into the next (after drinking half of the next bottle).
It goes pretty slow using an open bottle (too little circulation) but it does go. I open the bottle every day or so and swish the contents around. It takes about 1 weak to even start smelling vinegary, and circa one month to really develop.
I've been sticking with the same variety of wine and not trying to diddle the sugar content.
I still have not developed a mat-like mother, but there does seem to be a culture there. I'm on the fourth generation now.
Answer 3
Acetobacter are aerobic, and not a whole lot of stuff can live in a greater than 10% alcohol solution, so you might be able to get away with putting the wine into an open-mouthed container and letting it sit out for a few days, to get going. You might cover it with a cheesecloth to keep dust and mold out. Of course, there's no guarantee that you won't pick up some other bacteria or wild yeast in the process.
Some sour beers have an acetic character to them, but I just looked at the Wyeast and White Labs web sites, and neither of them sell straight Acetobacter.
Aren't there some vinegars that are sold still alive, with some mother culture in the bottle?
Answer 4
The trick to making vinegar is the container. Place the wine in a plastic bottle and make a hole just above the wine (no sense in making a hole under the wine...). Make another hole opposite the first one, but on a higher level.
Place the container in a dry and dark spot and wait. When it smells like vinegar, you're done.
The trick with the holes creates a current that aerates the wine.
I've never done it myself, but an enologist told me.
Answer 5
Wine becomes vinegar when in contact with oxygen. To speed up the process, if you are worried that bacterias would start growing, I would try to pour the wine in a larger ovenware and cover with a cloth. This should give result quicker than just leaving the wine in an open bottle.
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